COP26 – What has landed on the Board’s Agenda?

Date: Wednesday December 1st 2021 at 1pm (GMT)

Summary

Board members have responsibility for the finances of their organisations and must exercise good financial judgement. This session aims to give board members and directors alike the essential skills and knowledge to understand financial information that they are typically provided with on a regular basis, what to ask for, warning signs to watch out for and questions to ask. We will discuss the the responsibilities of board members in financial matters along with a high-level overview of the key financial reports along with warning signs that could indicate financial trouble.

COP26 feels more real than COP25 or COP in Paris in 2015. Now the agenda and risk are squarely in the lap of business.

In the words of Dr. Patrick Soon-Siong, a medical doctor now focused on addressing vaccination more innovatively, we do not know what we do not know and “we could well be past the tipping point” in terms of harm to our planet.

The acronym of ESG means something different to everybody and business has journeyed the path of adopting many aspects of the ESG agenda. It is the “modern agenda” part of ESG that business should consider. What are the environmental issues business can own, how do we source, supply, socialise communication, travel, transport and consider the human aspects of our communities, and importantly the governance changes, new and those already adopted in Codes and Guidelines.

The latter, governance, might well be on the agenda, social may have improved through the pandemic suffering, and environment is difficult to own for many businesses.

Our panel is Byron Loflin, Global Head of Board Engagement at Nasdaq, Inga Relph who brings strategic insight and policy innovation to attain global development goals, and Zanagee Artis a young university student, participant at COP26, who is founder of a youth led climate justice organisation called Zero Hour.

We expect some challenging conversations to evolve with the broad spectrum of expertise and perspectives on this panel. The winner will be Boards getting to grips with the focus areas arising.

Speakers:

1. Inge Relph – Co-Founder and Executive Director of GlobalChoices

Inge Relph is known for her strategic insight and bold policy innovation around global systems change to achieve the Environmental and Social Development Goals.

She was Senior Policy Advisor to ‘The Elders’, a group that included President Carter, Mary Robinson, Kofi Annan and Gro Brundtland, during the landmark SDG and COP21 negotiations and has advised the Vatican, The Commonwealth Secretariat and several governments. With a corporate background in strategy, restructuring and marketing with Blue Chip companies like British Airways and British Gas, she went on to lead the sustainability practice of a Swiss Fintech platform that was the first to list fungible tokenised natural capital assets. Inge is a Board member of the Responsible Finance and Investment Foundation, is on the Advisory Boards of Climate Action and Procivis Switzerland and sat on the G20 Sustainable Finance Innovation Inquiry.

She is a regular speaker on sustainable innovation and the opportunity agenda of ESG.

2. Byron Loflin – Global Head of Board Engagement at Nasdaq

Byron Loflin is Global Head of Board Engagement at Nasdaq, where he leads board assessments and boardroom training for Nasdaq Governance Solutions. He is the founder and former CEO of the Centre for Board Excellence (CBE) – acquired by Nasdaq in 2019 – and is architect of CBE’s unique board assessment and advisory platform. Byron is recognised in the governance community for developing unique products that address
board dynamics, corporate culture, accountability and performance. His experience and expertise are in the design and administration of assessments and advising board chairs, boards, committees, directors and executive management in a full range of corporate governance matters including strategic alignment, best practices, board refreshment, diversity, structures and corporate planning.

Byron is a graduate of Harvard Business School (OPM) and James Madison University (BA). He is a member of the Society for Corporate Governance, Institute of Directors (UK), and the National Association of Corporate Directors.

3. Zanagee Artis – Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director at Zero Hour

Zanagee Artis is a 21 year-old from Clinton, Connecticut, USA studying political science and environmental studies in his final year at Brown University.

He is a founder, a co-executive director, and the policy director of the global youth-led climate justice organization Zero Hour. Zanagee is also co-author of A Kids Book About Climate Change and co-host of 1 Point 5: A Kids Podcast About Climate Justice. Artis has been featured in a number of publications for his work on climate justice and climate policy, including The New York Times, Teen Vogue, andedie.

In March of 2022, Zanagee will travel to Antarctica with the 2041 Project as an ambassador of the Global Choices Arctic Angels Network.

4. The panel will be facilitated by Sharon Constançon. Sharon’s client list includes regulated businesses including FTSE, SME, family, investment trusts, insurance, financial services, mutuals, health services, charities and the housing sector. Sharon has a well-attested reputation for providing confidential, straightforward, honest and effective board evaluations which have successfully empowered boards to improve their performance.

Date: Wednesday 1st December 2021
Time: 13:00
Venue: Zoom
Cost : Free